Is This Thing On?
by MadQuinn13
Summary: 100poundsofcatfish requested sad angsty fighting. I did a lot more than that. Black Hill.


Nick Fury was sitting across from the counsel retelling the events that led to this mess.

"This could not have been foreseen. It never became an issue until Rogers discovered that James Barnes was alive and being controlled by a terrorist cell. In hindsight we should have paid more attention when Agent Romanoff said that he looked familiar but she couldn't remember how."

Five months earlier

Steve Roger was over joyed to have Bucky back. Finally someone who understood him, they were like brothers and now when Steve needed someone Becky was back. Yes they had to do some deprograming but luckily they had some practice with that as they found out with Natasha.

But now Bucky was himself again, not trying to kill innocent people of the President of the United States. He was back to fighting for freedom instead of the Commies. Like all the good men.

The rest of the S.H.I.E.L.D didn't seem to mind the fact that Steve Roger's had a buddy who also was frozen in the ocean but only he was missing an arm.

Natasha avoided him as much as she could, she couldn't shake the feeling the she didn't want to remember where she knew him from. Sadly he did remember and he wanted her to remember too.

Present Time.

"The list of casualties is lower than we expected it to be. This is due to the fact that we believe she had some control at the beginning."

"Why do you think she had it at the beginning but not the end? Director?"

"She never would have done that if she had any control."

Four Months Earlier.

No one really knew what happened, Jane Foster was in the ICU unit on the brink of death, her location was kept hidden, no one without the highest clearance in S.H.I.E.L.D knew where she was.

It happened again two weeks later, only this time it was Pepper Potts. She was attacked in Stark Towers J.A.R.V.I.S was hacked into and the footage of the attack was erased.

More disconcerting was the unknown whereabouts of a S.H.I.E.L.D agent. Agent Romanoff disappeared while on a mission two days before both attacks. Only to reappear covered in blood outside of Agent's Hill apartment with no memory of her disappearance.

It wasn't until the third attack that questions started getting answers.

Agent Clint Barton was the next victim to the attacks and when Agent Romanoff disappeared it was after Agent Hill saw her take a phone call that lasted five seconds before Agent Hill came back from the kitchen and found the window open and Natasha gone.

Luckily Agent Barton was more skilled at combat than the other victims and was able to defend himself. He had a few holes in his body and ribs that were in more pieces than a jigsaw puzzle. But he could still do up the report about what happened and how he 'fixed' Agent Romanoff with a large hit to the head.

Agent Romanoff was to be kept under constant guard. Hannibal Lector had less security than she did. She requested as much even if she had to fight the second in command to do so.

"Natasha this is ridiculous you are not going to be kept locked up." Maria wasn't allowing this to happen.

"It could happen again and I don't want the next person to be you. I can't live with that Maria."

"You had some control, not a lot but you had some. Barton said he heard you coming, you fired five bullets on the way, no one else in the building was hurt. The fact that Jane Foster and Pepper Potts are still alive shows that you had some control. You didn't let them die." Maria wasn't going to let Natasha blame herself for this, she already had more than enough guilt for one person.

"If I had control then why can't I remember any of it? Why did I just show up at your place covered in blood? Didn't that worry you? Didn't you worry who's blood it was?"

"I was more relieved that you were okay after all you went missing both times." It was true Maria should have been more concerned with the blood suddenly covering her girlfriend but the fact that she was no longer missing and that the blood wasn't hers, she didn't think about who's blood it was.

"You need to make up a list of everyone who could know the triggers." Natasha knew that was the only way to keep it from happening.

"How am I supposed to do that when you can't even remember who could know?" Maria was going to do it and even pull men away from other unimportant projects, she wanted Natasha to get out of the cell and come home.

"You're smart. If anyone can figure it out it's you." Natasha smiled at her. "How is everyone doing?"

"Barton should be back to active duty in a few weeks once his ribs heal, Jane Foster was removed from ICU and Pepper Potts is stable." Even if the news wasn't good she would lie. She wasn't going to make Natasha's guilt worse.

"Does anyone besides Clint remember seeing me?"

"They both do."

"More reason for me to be locked up. I expect once Pepper is released Stark will make an appearance here." Natasha wasn't looking forward to that. She was going to have to apologize too. She hated that more.

"He's already been explained. Once he was told that she was going to recover fully he mostly wanted to know how you hacked J.A.R.V.I.S…how did you do that? Our best tech guys can't even do that." Natasha just shrugged in response.

"Do we know if Thor knows about the attack?" Natasha had been thrown into a wall by The Hulk, she didn't want to know if it hurt less or more than being hit with Thor's hammer…or lightning…or both.

"Not yet but we will make sure you are safe if he does find out."

"Why? It's only fair to let him give me matching injuries."

"No it's not." Maria didn't care what Natasha thought she wasn't going to let that happen. If Thor could forgive his murderous adopted brother he could let this slide too. Hill wanted to smash the receiver in her ear, she didn't want to go answer to Fury she wanted to stay with Natasha and make sure she didn't do anything stupid, like blame herself for it anymore.

"I will be back as soon as I can. Do not do anything else stupid. This cell was stupid enough."

Two Months Earlier

"Natasha stop being stupid and come home." Maria wanted to knock some sense into her, they went two months without any incidents and Natasha was out of the cell, even if she didn't want to be but she had yet to be alone in a room with Maria let alone back home to their apartment, well Maria's apartment but Natasha usually spent as much time there with her as she could.

"I'm not letting you be the next victim."

"I could defend myself." Maria really hated how Natasha knew that not many people could best her in hand to hand.

"Could you kill me?"

"I wouldn't have to."

"You might. You would you be able to kill me in order to save yourself?"

Maria was silent for a moment. "I wouldn't be able to kill you to save the world. You're more important."

"That's why I'm not leaving. That's why I don't want to be alone with you. I don't want you to get hurt."

"Well I have a say in that and that's not happening."

"Maria."

"Natasha. It's done. It's over."

"It can't be over. Not yet. Why would it stop at Clint?"

"I don't know but it's fine Nat. It's all done."

"No it's not." She looked down at the list that Maria had complied. "But it will be soon."

"They will kill you. They have been trying to kill you for years."

"They've been failing to kill me for years."

"Well, all it takes is one time for failure to be success."

"I can do it. I know I can do it. When it's done I'm all yours."

"Natasha don't do it."

"I should've done it long ago, none of this would've happened if I did!"

"So why didn't you? Why didn't any of this occur to you before?"

"I didn't have anything to lose before…" Maria tried to stop Natasha, but she couldn't, the former Russian left without another word, taking her arm back when Maria tried to literally stop her.

Present

"Agent Hill found the phone Agent Romanoff received the call on. She traced the number back to Barnes." Fury took a sip of water from the glass in front of him.

"If she knew it was Barnes why wasn't he in custody before the final event happened?"

"He was. His last move before we reached him, he told Rogers he didn't have the clearance to see Agent Romanoff and asked him to pass on a message. It was in Russian a language Rogers does not speak. He thought it was a form of hope."

"It was not?"

"It was the trigger."

Five Hours Ago

Natasha didn't remember anything after she left S.H.I.E.L.D. base. Steve had stopped her on her way out and said something, she couldn't remember what. She had to look around to realize where she was.

"Maria?" She didn't know why she was here, just standing in Maria's living room, there was bloody foot prints leading from the bedroom and that made Natasha's heart stop. She ran into the room, she saw Maria's gun on the nightstand. Maria was lying on the floor. "Maria?" Natasha tried to stop the bleeding, she tried to fix it. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I…I'm sorry. I tried to stop all this. I didn't want this to happen." Natasha could feel her pulse weakening. "Maria…please…please just wake up. It's okay. You're okay. You're going to be okay." She didn't really know when her sight started to get blurry until she saw her own tears fall onto Maria's face. When she couldn't find a pulse anymore she started doing CPR. Natasha wasn't going to let her stop, she couldn't stop Maria couldn't die not like this. After a half hour Natasha knew it was impossible to bring her back. She looked up at the nightstand and saw the gun.

She killed Maria…there were so many injuries. If they wanted her to be the one to kill Maria why wouldn't they just let her fire one shot to the head, quick and easy. Why did she have to use so many different ways. She could still see the knives on the floor, the potato peeler which she didn't even want to think about what it did. She took the gun from it's resting place, leaned down to kiss Maria's on the forehead. "I'm so so sorry."

One Hour Later.

Fury came when one of neighbors reported hearing a gun shot. He came in time to see the paramedics wheel out two body bags.

He saw the foot steps the two sets leading in and out of the bedroom. The large bloodstain in the floor which he was told belonged to Maria and the splatter on the bed and walls. He heard that one belonged to Natasha. Blowing one's brains out was messy. The only way to make sure she couldn't survive.

Present

"We lost two good agents due to a slight oversight. You want to blame Agent Romanoff? You can't. Blame the people who made her a sleeper, who created to triggers. Blame Barnes."

"Where is Barnes now?"

"I suspect he is going to be found dead with arrows in his body and severely beaten."

"Why do you suspect this?"

"He made very powerful enemies when he did what he did."


End file.
